And All You Love
by lannerz
Summary: Tywin Lannister tells Arya about his late wife, Joanna, and teaches her a very important lesson, one she is unsure that she can take to heart.


**Author's Notes:** One of the great things about the show is that scenes between Arya and Tywin. I really think the actors did a great job. Season two definitely faltered and stumbled a bit, but those changes were lovely, even if I am very fond of Roose Bolton for some strange reason.

**Disclaimer: **GRRM owns all of these characters and also my soul.

**And All You Love**

Another meeting gone bad, another sour Tywin Lannister.

Arya knew that she should be afraid of the man, wary at the least, but she'd grown strangely…accustomed to Lord Tywin. He had honor about him, however twisted it was, and she was certain that he cared for his children, even if he never ever showed it or acted like it. Perhaps he just showed it in a different way, like how he would go out of his way to make sure she knew who all the lords were or how when she'd accidentally spilled wine on one of the lords and the man almost smacked her on the spot, Lord Tywin had stopped the man cold with a simple glare. She'd made sure to never spill wine again, save for that one terrifying incident with Littlefinger, and Tywin seemed almost proud of her for that. He had once even said that she was the only cupbearer he'd had to have never spilled as much wine as she'd poured.

(She didn't know why she took so much pride in that – it was pouring wine for _Lannister_ men, for the Seven's sake – but she'd smiled to herself that night as she'd cleaned up the table.)

Once the last lord walked out of the room, Arya got to work cleaning up the table. She jumped and nearly dropped the plates she was holding when Tywin slammed the door shut with a bang. Every time a meeting went badly, he would sit by the fire, staring into it, and think for an hour. She would not call it sulking, but he certainly wasn't happy about things. She had never thought that so much thought went into war, but apparently there was a lot more than just fighting on the field and killing people and waving banners. There were no songs sung about war councils, which seemed to be the majority of what war actually was.

"Bloody idiots, all of them… Completely worthless…" He paced through the room before finally settling in his chair. "Wine, girl."

"Yes, my lord." It had taken a while for her to get used to the idea of saying _my lord_ all the time to Tywin Lannister, a man that she wanted very much dead, but it was almost like breathing now. She still refused to say _m'lord _like he'd pointed out, even though it terrified her. She might not by Arya Stark to him, but she would be to herself, at least for now. Arya set the plates down so she could fetch the jug and refill his glass and hand it to him.

Tywin swirled the wine around in the glass. "Since your stonemason father taught you everything, perhaps he taught you how to win a war when you have idiots on your council as well."

Arya hesitated in responding, unsure of what he wanted her to say. She'd concocted the story about her father being a stonemason in hopes that it would never be brought up again, and yet Tywin continued to do so. The more he did, the more she had to lie; and the more questions he asked, the more she had to lie. A girl could only lie so much before she was caught. Arya often lied awake in bed, worrying that she'd contradicted herself earlier, and would spend half the night trying to remember all the stories and lies she'd constructed about herself so she wouldn't trip up. It was one thing to be a Northerner in the midst of the Lannister camp; it would be something much different and much worse to be Arya Stark.

"My father didn't care for war," was the response she settled on.

"Few people do."

As Tywin sipped on his wine and stared into the fire, Arya resumed cleaning the table. She did hate cleaning – she always had – but she didn't mind getting her hands dirty like a servant either. Sansa would've hated this even more, fretting about how she got stuff on her hands or under her nails, but Arya didn't even flinch. She'd grown accustomed to cleaning after all the men to the point where she could tell who sat where just by what they'd been eating or what had been left on their plate. Hot Pie convinced her a few times to scrape the leftovers into a bag so they could snack on them, but Gendry had nearly gone into a panic when he'd found out. He'd said they were stealing food and stealing food was the last thing they should be doing when people were being hanged all around them for mere whispers of treachery. Arya didn't know how eating the food that no one else wanted and was supposed to be thrown away was treachery, but she'd stopped doing it nonetheless – after a few more times, at least.

"You know, from all the times we've spoke and you told me something about yourself, you never mention your mother," Tywin abruptly said, still looking at the fire.

Arya stopped wiping the table off with a rag, thinking about what he'd said. She had only ever talked about her father, the man who had been killed by honor, the man who she hadn't seen get beheaded but still had nightmares about. He'd tried to send them away from King's Landing – he'd said things were dangerous – but neither she nor Sansa had believed him truly. She'd been so selfish. And since her time on the road and at Harrenhaal, all she'd been able to think about was her father. She hadn't even seen her lady mother since she'd left Winterfell over a year ago, but she could still picture Catelyn Stark's face as clear as day. They looked nothing alike – they acted nothing alike, she'd always thought – but she missed her mother's sweet embrace and burying her face in her mother's bright red hair. She had loved her father and perhaps even favored him, but no one was capable of comforting her like her mother. She was suddenly struck by how much she missed her mother, and it hurt.

"I…I didn't know my mother." Arya bit her lip, hoping that all this lying about her parents wouldn't get her in trouble with the Old Gods or the Seven somehow. Not knowing her mother would explain why she never talked about her mother though. "I don't even know what she looked like. All I know is that my father loved her and she loved him, but… She died…giving birth to me."

"Hm." Tywin fixed her with an unflinching gaze, which she did not look away from. Perhaps that was wrong to do (after all, she was talking about her dead mother, so she should look very sad), but she had learned never to back down or look away when it came to Tywin Lannister. If this was a test, then she would do exceedingly well. Finally, when he seemed to accept this bit of knowledge, he looked back to the fire and took a sip from his wine. "My wife died in childbirth with my son Tyrion."

Arya furrowed her brow. Though Tyrion Lannister, the Imp, was not as old as the Queen or the Kingslayer, it had been quite a while since his birth. "You never remarried, my lord?"

"No, I did not think I needed to," Tywin replied simply.

"But don't you… Don't you get lonely?"

Tywin turned to look at her again. "Did your father remarry after your mother died?"

Arya thought about it for a minute and shook her head. She knew that her father and mother had married each other out of duty because she had been promised to her father's older brother before his murder, but they had grown to love each other for more than just duty. She didn't think her mother would remarry, no matter what was asked of her.

"Loneliness is for the weak," Tywin told her in a no-nonsense tone. He was right though. She had felt more than lonely in King's Landing and she'd felt even lonelier when she'd been on the road with the Night's Watch. It had only been until she'd started talking to Gendry, who had in turn helped make Hot Pie and even Lommy more bearable to talk with, that things had gotten better. "Needing people will only hurt you in the end. You would do well to remember that, girl."

Arya frowned. She thought of Gendry in the armory, always willing to talk to her when she felt sad, or Hot Pie in the kitchens, who she liked to bother and nick food from but never once complained about her. She had never thought about needing them until now, but… She didn't want to think about what she would be like here without them to keep her grounded. There were times when she wanted to go off the reservations and she felt such an intense hatred for the people they were stuck with – but then Gendry would give her that look, like he knew what she was thinking, and would shake his head, and she'd call him stupid and everything was fine. Sometimes she and Hot Pie would talk about all the delicious food that they missed or wanted to try, just because it took their minds off of how miserable they were. Maybe she needed them, and maybe it was a bad thing, but she didn't want to lose them either.

"What was her name?" Arya suddenly asked. When Tywin raised an eyebrow, she hastily added, "If you don't mind me asking, my lord. It's just… I don't even know my mother's name. My father never wanted to talk about her."

Tywin took a deep breath and set the glass down on the stand near his chair. "Her name was Joanna. She was…more beautiful than I can describe. I was older than her, but she was very bright. I could trust her with anything, and I knew I would be safe. Not many people can say that, and I certainly would not say that about anyone now. She was most definitely my better half. I could rule, but she was the person that people loved."

"You must have been very sad when she died," Arya said, trying not to think of how her mother was dealing with her father's death. She wanted to think that her mother was strong and nothing would break her, but it scared her to think of how alone her mother must feel. She wanted to be the one to comfort her mother now and also to have her mother's comfort, but instead she was here with Tywin Lannister, her family's enemy.

"I learned that day to never rely on people," Tywin explained in a detached voice. "Anyone can be taken from you at any given moment, even during what should be the happiest time of your life. You can only rely on yourself."

"I'm never going to marry," Arya muttered, more to herself than anything else.

A chuckle from Tywin made her look up at him sharply. "You say that now, but come in a few years, you'll meet some strapping young lad that will promise you the world and maybe, just maybe, you won't be so smart."

"I won't," Arya said resolutely, a frown on her face, "because they'll just leave me in the end. Everyone does. And you said it yourself: I can't rely on anyone, not even the person I marry or love. You loved your wife and you trusted her, but she was still taken from you, the same as my mother was taken from my father and my father was taken from me."

"Of course they will; anyone can be killed." Tywin picked up his glass again and finished the rest of the wine. "You're too young to understand though. It does not matter how smart you are; it only takes a moment of weakness to allow yourself to love and then it's over." Arya didn't want to believe him, but she couldn't help but think of all the times she had thought she hated Sansa, only to remember that she loved her. None of the songs that were sung told of the stupidity of love, but it had to be true. Love was stupid, and she would never love, but perhaps it was already too late. There were already so many people she thought she couldn't bear to be without, no matter how hard she tried to make herself feel nothing. If her father could be killed, anyone could be killed, but she still had attachments to people. "Now get some wood for the fire, and then you're done for the night."

Arya ducked out of the room quickly and quietly with Tywin staring into the fire silently.


End file.
